Bay Area artists looking to show off their talent can look to the Geneva Car Barn in San Francisco on San Jose Avenue, which is currently accepting applications/designs for a temporary mural project. They want to create murals alongside the brick building, which will be displayed for up to three years.
The Geneva Car Barn was built in 1901 and was originally used for San Francisco’s first electric railway. The building has now been recognized as a landmark for the city. The building is typically leased out and used by a non-profit organization known as the Community Arts Stabilization Trust (CAST). They also work with Performing Arts Workshop (PAW), in which they help provide a wide variety of different activities for the community and youth.
The mural will roughly be around 800 square feet and will be placed on the windows on the second level of the building on the west side. The San Francisco Arts Commission (SFAC) wants the mural to help support and continue pursuing cultural identity, community storytelling and most importantly neighborhood visibility.
Others see this is a great step in the right direction like Dylan Garcia ’27 who believes that the installation will be a great improvement. “The building for the most part, looks kind of plain. Adding a mural will help make it stand out more and make it more unique,” he said.
All designs/submissions for the mural were due by Apr. 6. After an artist’s work has been chosen and the design has been finalized, the Geneva Car Barn is aiming for the mural project to be completed by Apr. 2027.
Art Teacher Irman Arcibal hopes that the final design will pay homage to the building’s history. “I hope that the chosen design does pay homage to the building’s past. It would be a missed opportunity for it to not play into the mural’s composition somehow. I find that the best public art does have ties to its specific space and place, rather than just being plopped down in a space simply because it was vacant,” he said.
Artist Sofia Pena ’26 believes that the mural will be a great opportunity for artists to showcase their talents.
“Having artists from the community be able to submit their art truly helps bring together a community of people to promote their work and also work together to create something special for the neighborhood,” she said.
The Geneva Car Barn mural project is a unique and interesting project for the community and will help bring together artists to show off their work and have it be displayed for the public. Helping bring together talented people and give a historic landmark some new light and appreciation.
